Study Desk

For the LORD has driven out from before you great nations and strong: but as for you, no man has stood before you to this day.

One man of you shall chase a thousand; for the LORD your God, he it is who fights for you, as he spoke to you.

know for a certainty that the LORD your God will no more drive these nations from out of your sight; but they shall be a snare and a trap to you, and a scourge in your sides, and thorns in your eyes, until you perish from off this good land which the LORD your God has given you.

Yehoshua gathered all the tribes of Yisra'el to Shekhem, and called for the Zakenim of Yisra'el, and for their heads, and for their judges, and for their officers; and they presented themselves before God.

If it seem evil to you to serve the LORD, choose you this day whom you will serve; whether the gods which your fathers served that were beyond the River, or the gods of the Amori, in whose land you dwell: but as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD.

for the LORD our God, he it is who brought us and our fathers up out of the land of Mitzrayim, from the house of bondage, and who did those great signs in our sight, and preserved us in all the way in which we went, and among all the peoples through the midst of whom we passed;

and the LORD drove out from before us all the peoples, even the Amori who lived in the land: therefore we also will serve the LORD; for he is our God.

Yehoshua said to the people, You can't serve the LORD; for he is a holy God; he is a jealous God; he will not forgive your disobedience nor your sins.

Yehoshua said to all the people, Behold, this stone shall be a witness against us; for it has heard all the words of the LORD which he spoke to us: it shall be therefore a witness against you, lest you deny your God.

Yisra'el served the LORD all the days of Yehoshua, and all the days of the Zakenim who outlived Yehoshua, and had known all the work of the LORD, that he had worked for Yisra'el.

The bones of Yosef, which the children of Yisra'el brought up out of Mitzrayim, buried they in Shekhem, in the parcel of ground which Ya`akov bought of the sons of Hamor the father of Shekhem for a hundred pieces of money: and they became the inheritance of the children of Yosef.

It happened after the death of Yehoshua, the children of Yisra'el asked of the LORD, saying, Who shall go up for us first against the Kana`anim, to fight against them?

She said to him, Give me a blessing; for that you have set me in the land of the South, give me also springs of water. Kalev gave her the upper springs and the lower springs.

The LORD was with Yehudah; and drove out [the inhabitants of] the hill-country; for he could not drive out the inhabitants of the valley, because they had chariots of iron.

but the Asheri lived among the Kana`anim, the inhabitants of the land; for they did not drive them out.

The Amori forced the children of Dan into the hill-country; for they would not allow them to come down to the valley;

The people served the LORD all the days of Yehoshua, and all the days of the Zakenim who outlived Yehoshua, who had seen all the great work of the LORD that he had worked for Yisra'el.

Also all that generation were gathered to their fathers: and there arose another generation after them, who didn't know the LORD, nor yet the work which he had worked for Yisra'el.

Wherever they went out, the hand of the LORD was against them for evil, as the LORD had spoken, and as the LORD had sworn to them: and they were sore distressed.

Yet they didn't listen to their judges; for they played the prostitute after other gods, and bowed themselves down to them: they turned aside quickly out of the way in which their fathers walked, obeying the mitzvot of the LORD; [but] they didn't do so.